It used to be pretty common to name sports cars after fast or ferocious animals. The Ford Mustang, Plymouth Barracuda, Shelby Cobra and Chevy Impala were names of domestic models of the 60s and 70s that fit the bill. But at Motorama 2025 this weekend, it was interesting to note how naming conventions changed.
Japanese cars of the 90s and beyond mostly got rid of the tradition of animal names. There were still some cute ones like the Nissan Bluebird, but for sports models, the style shifted to alphanumeric codes instead like the Nissan GTR, Mazda RX-7 and Honda S2000.
This year there were a bunch of old school vans in the back room at Motorama 2025. Seems the old Vanning craze from the 70s got jump-started again by recent VanLife camping trend. But the vintage vehicles on display were urban pleasure palaces, not campers. The Dodge Tradesman and Chevrolet Sportvan were customized and christened Boogie Vans and Shaggin’ Wagons by their owners, which would have been cool names for Detroit to have come up with!
After 100 years, it must be tough to come up with creative new names. Trends shifted from speedy animal names like the Ford Falcon, to acronyms like Subaru WRX (World Rally eXperimental) and later to meaningless jumbles of letters like the Toyota BZR4 or Merkur XR4Ti. Hopefully, naming conventions come full circle to animal names again.
Demaras Racing’s spirit animal, the one that always wins the race, has been overlooked. Who wouldn’t be interested in a high-powered, family-sedan called the Toyota Tortoise GT. That’s marketing gold right there.
Your spirit animal! *snort*
Tortoise won the race, didn’t he?
Darn tootin
Cool cars and names. “Ba ba ba Barracuda!” Do you get Car and Driver magazine? Check out this article: https://www.caranddriver.com/features/a64074858/polestar-sweden-arctic-circle/